Mark is looking for an appropriate segment to position this market in, and I advised him against a pure consumer solution if his assumption is that the business model would be an ad-supported mobile app.

"I'd rather be in early than sit back and wait and let my competitors get early traction," says Ken Willner, CEO of Zumobi, a Seattle-based developer of ad-supported apps for big media brands including MSNBC and Today.

Marketers are expected to rev up their online-ad spending 16% in 2011 to $30.1 billion, with the Internet ranking as the second largest ad-supported medium, accounting for a 17.3% share of the total U.S. ad market, Magnaglobal says.